Haydn’s Opus 51 was commissioned for theOratorio de la Santa Cueva,the Holy Cave Oratory, in Cádiz, Spain, a church, as the name suggests, built partially underground, it would beperformed, the Opus 51, for the Good Friday service of 1787, Haydn therefore put his Opus 50on hold, six string quartets, to finish this ecclesiastical work on time

what had been required was a work for small orchestra to inform the Seven Last Words of our Saviour on the Cross, it would therefore have at leastsegments, movements, and would be divided by the elaboration of the bishop upon the significance of these individual “Words”, or, in fact,statements, see this example

Haydn added an introduction, and a finale in the form of an earthquake,quite, I think, wittily and ever so appropriately

to my mind “The Seven Last Words of Our Saviour on the Cross” is Haydn’s crowning achievement, in all of its iterations

you’ll note that there is even first of all a title, and the title asks for something quite specific, indeed words, which the composer wouldhave to render musically, somehow, he’d need drama, something of a musical narrative, no minuets

all of the movements, apart from the end ones, are variations on slow – adagio, lento, largo, even grave – and how do you keep an audience, or in this case a congregation, happy, or even interested, with seven potentially lugubrious adagios in a row, all profoundly melancholy

only Shostakovich has managed to do that since, which I’ll talk about at some point later

Haydn also undoubtedly inspired Beethoven here with the consequences of so many movements, the possibility of extending a musical intentioninto something resembling,indeed, a book, a story, the introduction of narrative, essentially, into our musical history, which is to say, musicas literature

the orchestral version of “The Seven Last Words” is performed here at the very Oratorio de laSanta Cueva, thestring quartetversion, played not only better than I’ve ever heard it playedbefore, but better even than any other quartet I’ve ever heard, period, includes the commentaries in German by an attendant prelate,as intended in the original composition

the movements’ “Seven Words” are indicated in Latin, not, incidentally, the language of “Our Saviour”, and move from “Lord, why have you forsaken me” to “If it is Your will, then let it be done”